Third Quarter Journal Assignments
 

1. Begin an essay draft on the best topic from your list of potential position paper topics.
2. Finish your poem from class or write ten observations beginning with "I see..." or "I saw..."  Include one other sense and a metaphor.
3. Prepare a typed position paper draft and bring a copy to share in class tomorrow.

Week of 3/4

1. Begin a page in your journal to collect ideas, statistics, quotes, sources, and experiences for your position paper topic.  Remember to keep a record of where you found information.
2. Find an excellent position paper.  Staple a copy into your journal and write an entry about the qualities of the paper that make it excellent.
3. Make a plan to respond to "No More MoonJune: Love's Out" by Richard Stengel.  Leave a record of your plan in your journal.
4. Revise your MoonJune response.  Leave a record of the revisions in your journal.  Or revise your personal essay using feedback from my assessment.  Staple your assessed draft and your revised "best" draft into your journal.

Week of 2/25

1. Revise your essay incorporating ideas from the word choice activity and the proofreading suggestions.  Staple a copy of your best draft into your journal and staple a copy to the signed, peer-edited copy from class.  Hand in  the latter copy tomorrow in class.
2. Write an observational poem about a decision, a realization or a moment connecting with nature.  Use one or more techniques or form ideas from the poems read in class.
3. Read "Between a Period and a Comma" and write a paragraph or a poem using semicolons in two different ways.

Week of 2/19

1. Read the paragraph section from On Writing by Stephen King.  Write down five ideas that you can use or that you find interesting.  Revise your personal essay looking at just the beginning/middle/end and the paragraphs.  *Extra entry: write a short review of the handout arguing that I should use it again or that I should not use it again.  Justify your answer.
2. Read "How Not to Write a Sentence." In your journal, list the three or four "sins' that you most often commit.  As penance, revise the sentences in your personal essay.  Also pay attention to sentence variety and incorporate any other ideas you have into the revision.  Bring a revised, clean copy to class on Friday.
3. Write ten observations beginning with "I see..." or "I saw..." Use at least one other sense in each description and provide many sensory details to make each description vivid to a reader.
4. Send me an email at [email protected] in which you assess your progress at mid-quarter.  Give yourself a grade for your class participation and justify it giving specific examples.  Give yourself a grade for your progress toward your goals and justify it giving examples from specific papers from this class.   Update your journal grade, and give yourself an overall grade for the quarter so far.  Justify the grade with specific examples and reasons.

Week of 2/11

1. Write a complete draft of a personal essay and type it.  You may choose a topic from your list, complete one of the drafts started in class, revise your writing sample or write on any other topic.  The completed typed draft is due on Tuesday.  Staple one copy of the draft in your journal and bring the other copy to class.  Number your out-of-class journal entries.  Star one entry for me to read.  The journals will be collected tomorrow (2/12).
2. Revise your personal essay incorporating ideas from your self conference, your peer conference, your dialogue or scene and/or your change in form.

Week of 2/4
 

1. Find a personal essay that you think is excellent.  Staple a copy of it into your journal and in a ten minute freewrite describe it and explain what makes it excellent.  Think about the techniques, ideas or form that you might like to use in your own personal essay.
2. Set five goals for yourself for the semester.  Why is each a good goal for you? Write two ideas on how you might reach each goal.
3. Read "An Interview With an Admissions Officer".  Write a seven-minute first reaction.  Then write a second seven-minute reaction starting with, "On the other hand..." or "Maybe I've misread this..." or "Another way to look at this is ..." in which you look at the article from a different perspective.
4. Take one of the personal essay topics from your list and write a rough draft.

Week of 1/28

1. Reread, revise, rewrite your writing sample.  Hand in the completed Writing sample tomorrow.
2. Make a list of ten possible topics for your personal essay. Next to each topic jot down any ideas, images, phrases, etc that you might use in the essay.
3. Read "That Crucial First Draft" and highlight the ten most important lines.  Select one line as the most important line, copy it into your journal and explain why you selected it.
4. Make a list of your strengths and weaknesses as a writer.
5. Write ten observations beginning with "I see..." or"I saw..."  Use only specific descriptions without metaphors, other senses or general descriptors.

Week of 1/23

1. Make your own list of the qualities of good writing.
2. Plan for your writing sample.  You will have a full class period Monday to complete the writing sample.

 

 
 





















































Second Quarter Journal Assignments

Week of 1/14

1. Complete your Overall assessment.  Be sure to list the grades you gave yourself for each other area.  Follow the scoring guidelines and look at your first quarter self-assessment as a model.

1. Complete your Progress Toward Goals self assessment for two of your goals.  Be sure to select a different piece of writing to illustrate your progress toward each goal.  Use the terms significant, satisfactory, fair or very poor to assess each goal.
2. Revise your feature article based on your in-class conference.  Bring four copies of a revised draft to class tomorrow.
3. Complete your Progress Toward Goals self assessment for your other three goals.  Be sure to select a different piece of writing to illustrate your progress toward each of the five goals.  Use the terms significant, satisfactory, fair or very poor to assess each goal.
4. Complete your Class Evaluation assessment.  Be thorough.  Follow the scoring guidelines.
5. Number the entries in your journal that were written out of class.  Complete your Journal assessment.  Be thorough.  Follow the scoring guidelines.

1. Revise your short story for dialogue punctuation.  Incorporate other suggestions into a new draft and staple a copy into your journal.
2. Complete your Class Participation self-assessment.  Be thorough.  Provide specific examples.  Follow the scoring guidelines.
3. Write a draft of your feature article that includes a title and context information.  Bring a typed draft to class on Monday.

Week of 12/17

1. Choose a question for your interview.  Brainstorm a list of smaller questions to ask your interviewee to help answer the big question. This list is not a script but it may help you start or restart the interview or the questions may remind you of important points to cover.
2. Free Choice #3
3. Conduct your interview.  Try to have a transcript written by the time we return from vacation.
4. Have a great break.  Be ready to draft your feature article when we get back.

Week of 12/10
 

1. Final revision and edit of your short story.  Spelling, mechanics, sentences, and paragraphs should be perfect.
2. Free  choice #2
3. Be curious.  Look for questions for you feature article interview.
4. Type up one of the poems you wrote this semester.  Break it into lines and stanzas.  Revise it for vividness, conciseness and rhythm.  Staple a copy in your journal and hand one in Monday.

Week of 12/3

1. Revise your short story incorporating ideas from your self conference and your peer conference.  Remember to put a revised copy in your journal.  Prepare to hand in your journal by numbering your out-of-class entries and selecting two entries for me to read.
2. Free choice.  (Remember to avoid diary-type entries)
3. Assess your class participation, your journal and the progress toward your goals.  Give yourself a grade for the first half of this quarter and justify that grade.
4. Revise your short story to show instead of tell.  Bring four copies of your revised short story to class on Monday!

1. Work on one of your story starts.  Or assess the position paper assignment and make suggestions for improving the assignment.
2. Revise your position paper incorporating ideas from my reading and adding source citations in the text. Add a Works Cited page and submit an electronic copy either attached to an email or on a disk. Also staple a clean "best" copy in your journal.
3. Read your short story article and prepare a five-minute summary to present to your group.
4. Prepare a typed draft of your short story.  Bring a copy to class on Monday.

1. Read "What Dialogue Can Do For Your Story."  Write a typed page of dialogue.  It may be a part of a story you are working on or something brand new.
2. Find a short story that you think is excellent.  Staple it into your journal and write about why it is excellent.  Look for techniques, form or ideas you can use.

1. Revise your position paper incorporating ideas from the in-class essay organization activity and your conferences.  Bring five clean copies to class tomorrow.
2. Revise your position paper based on your writing conference.  Hand in your final draft on Tuesday.
3. Finish your circular, incremental and dialectical poems.
4. Set five writing goals for the second quarter.  You may keep some of your old ones, rewrite them, design new ones or make a combination of all three.  Discuss what you will do to achieve each goal.

React to the first quarter self assessment.  Staple your self-assessment into your journal.

Rest.  And buy a new journal for second quarter.

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Below is a list of future or potential second quarter journal entries
 

• Select a single topic and write three poems on the same topic: an incremental poem, a circular poem and a dialectical poem.  Notice how the form changes what you say.  (If the poems are long enough or detailed enough, this may be three separate entries.  Remember most entries should take about fifteen to twenty minutes.)
• Write a new poem that has a deliberate shape (incremental, circular, dialectical or a combination of two or all three).  Or select an old poem you have written and revise it into a more powerful or effective shape.
• Either continue the character assignment* from class or try it with a new character.  (*Make a list of characters you might use in a story.  Select one character, describe her and put her in a setting that is typical for her or one she would never be in.  Describe the setting and give her a problem. Get her up and running.  See what happens.  Remember to include the elements of a story.)
• Keep a list in your journal of characters, voices, settings and conflicts you might use in a story.  Keep your eyes, ears, nose and brain open for ideas and ask, "What if?"
• Prepare a typed draft of your short story.  Bring three copies to class tomorrow.
• Read "Plot, the Bones of a Story" and write short definitions of how Conrad defines the terms MDQ, TENSION, CONFLICT, PARADOX and COMPLICATIONS or OBSTACLES.  Write a short description how each applies to your story.  Revise your story incorporating any new ideas and bring four copies to class.
• Free Choice #2.  (Remember that all entries must be drafts, revisions, observations, collections of ideas for writing or reflections about class, articles or your writing.)
• Revise your short story and hand in the final version on Monday, December 11.
• Have a writing conference with Ms. Citrone or with me.  Staple in the piece you worked on, note the date you met and summarize the conference in your journal.
• Revise your short story for the skills covered or free choice.
• Find a feature article based on an interview that you think is excellent.  Staple it into your journal and write about why it is excellent.  Look for techniques, forms or ideas you can use.
• Free Choice #3 or type up a poem you wrote based on one or more of the ideas, forms or techniques from one of the poems read in class on Wednesday.
• Choose a question for your feature article, choose someone to interview and plan your interview.
• Revise your short story incorporating any revision suggestions that seem useful and all the editing corrections.  Staple this "best draft" into your journal.
• Write a list of questions you could use in your interview.
• Type up a transcript of your interview.  You don't need to type up any parts that you know you won't use.  Select the best quotes to use at the beginning or the end of the article.
• Read "The Last Word" and write three different endings for your feature article.
• Revise your feature article based on your in-class conference (adding, clarifying, cutting and editing.)  Your final draft is due Tuesday, January 16.
• Select and type up two poems that you wrote this semester to revise in class on Thursday.
• Revise your best piece from the semester for a read-around on Friday.
• Write ten observations using metaphors or similes or five observations using extended metaphors.
• Write down overheard conversations that might lend themselves to a story.
• Continue or revise any of the short stories begun or presented in class:
•  the postcard story;
•  a story that begins with a memorable character;
•  the "In the Current" - form story;
•  a short story in fifty-five words or less;
•  a second person viewpoint story;
•  a story that begins with dialogue;
• (Remember that these must be clearly worked on out-of-class to count for your journal.)
• Any other story starts or drafts done out-of-class whether they worked out or not.
• Staple in all short story drafts.
• Jot down any questions, topics or possible interview subjects that occur to you out of class.
• Write a poem in one of forms presented in class (incremental, circular or dialectical.)

Write another poem borrowing ideas from the ones read in class.
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First Quarter Journal Assignments

1. React in your journals to the experience of the writing sample - feelings, observations, questions, problems, complaints.  In what ways did the circumstances match those in which you do your best writing?  In what context(s) (place, time, purpose, tools, materials, etc.) do you do your best writing?
2. Staple into your journal both the handwritten draft of your personal essay and the typed draft.  If you only have a typed draft, write another litany.
3. Revise your personal essay incorporating ideas from your self conference and, if you completed your conference, the feedback you received from your conference partner.  Remember to staple all drafts into your journal.
4. Reread and revise your travel or sports piece begun in class.  Add sensory details, colors and/or dialogue to make the piece more vivid.
5. Revise your essay incorporating ideas from the word choice activity and the proofreading suggestions.  Staple a hard copy of your best draft into your journal and bring one to hand in tomorrow in class.  Also submit an electronic copy either on a disk, in my drop file or attached to an email.
6. Confer with Ms. Citrone about a college essay, a paper from this course or a paper from any other course.  Staple in the piece you worked on, note the date you met and summarize the conference in your journal.
7. Make a list of ten issues for which you might want to write a position paper.  Leave three lines between each item to add ideas, illustrations, reasons, sources, facts, etc.
8. Write an essay draft on the best topic from your list of potential position paper topics.
9. Evaluate the website. How is the website well done or useful?  What is a weakness?  What suggestion(s) do you have to improve the website?
10. Prepare a typed position paper best draft that includes an introduction that pulls your target audience into your paper, states your proposition clearly, supports the proposition with at least two paragraphs and concludes by pulling your reader out of the argument through a larger issue.
11. Revise your position paper incorporating ideas from your self-conference and from your partner conference.
12. Complete your Class Participation self assessment.  Look at the models.  Use the rubric.  Be thorough.  Follow the scoring guidelines.
13. Complete your Progress Toward Goals self assessment for your first and second goals.  Be sure to select a piece of writing that illustrates your progress toward each goal.  Use the terms poor, fair, satisfactory and significant to assess your progress.  Use the rubric.  Follow the scoring guidelines.
14. Complete your Progress Toward Goals self assessment for your third, fourth and fifth goals.  Be sure to select a piece of writing that illustrates your progress toward each goal.  Use the terms poor, fair, satisfactory and significant to assess your progress.  Use the rubric.  Follow the scoring guidelines.
15. Complete your Class Evaluation assessment.  Be thorough.  Follow the scoring guidelines.
16. Complete your Journal assessment.  Be thorough.  Follow the scoring guidelines.  (34 entries)
17. Complete your Overall assessment.  Be sure to list the grades you gave yourself for each other area.  Follow the scoring guidelines and look at the models.

Below is a list of future or potential first quarter journal entries

• Make a list of ten topics for your personal essay.  Leave three lines between each item for writing down any ideas, images, bits of dialogue or others words/ phrases that go with each topic.
• Revise your essay incorporating feedback you got received from your revision group.
• Edit your essay using feedback you received from your editing groups.
• Write a litany.
• Revise your essay to remove the telling and develop the showing.
• Write five detailed descriptions using a specific metaphor or extended metaphor for each and also using more than two or more sense descriptions.
• Type up two of the poems you started in class or in your journal.